The southwestern coastal communities of Satkhira and Khulna districts of the degraded lower Ganges delta of Bangladesh, are in the outskirt of the Sundarbans ECA (Ecologically Critical Area) where a combination of climatic and human induced factors such as rising sea level, erratic rainfall, increased water and soil salinity, rapidly declining freshwater sources, prolonged drought, unplanned Shrimp and Crab farming, illegal leasing and canal conversion have worsened fresh water shortages and rendered traditional agriculture increasingly untenable, adversely affecting livelihoods of climate vulnerable coastal communities.

The communities’ vulnerabilities intensify especially during dry seasons, due to rapid degradation and conversion of the available freshwater canal networks, resulting from human induced actions such as elite capture, resource grabbing, leasing and illegal conversion of these canal systems into ponds and channels used for unplanned and unsustainable Shrimp and Crab farming. These human induced stressors have significantly interfered with and degraded the storage capacity of freshwater (rainwater), a precious resource which boosts agrifood systems, livestock production and capture fisheries, further increasing vulnerabilities of coastal communities. These factors combined with climate induced calamities such as rising sea levels, increasing frequent cyclones and other natural calamities, coastal inundation, soil-water salinity, resource depletion and degradation resulted in increasing social-ecological vulnerabilities, leading to poverty, exclusion, food insecurity and migration.

Unsustainable land use, underpinned by the recent phenomenon of Climate Change, has induced numerous hazards and uncertainties. In dry seasons, most cropland remains dry and fallow due to extreme heat, unavailable freshwater sources due to converted canal systems, and high soil and water salinity. Making significant proportion of arable land into a single cropland, traditionally Monsoon Rice (Amon), this lack of diversity leads to unprecedented food insecurities and seasonal migration.